Local Men Among Youngest Warriors

HAMPTON — Americans might shake their heads when teen-agers are shown lugging automatic weapons and waging war in Africa or East Asia. Surely, the United States would never use children as soldiers.

Surely it did and does.

An estimated 100,000 men and women under the age of 18 - and some much younger - served in World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. There are documented cases of 12-year-old boys being inducted during World War II, despite a law forbidding anyone under 17 to join the military.

On the Peninsula, seven former soldiers and sailors belong to the local chapter of the Veterans of Underage Military Service at American Legion Post 25 in Hampton. VUMS started in 1991 and has about 1,500 members nationwide.

The group wants to find more people who enlisted underage and inform them of their entitlements, which include an honorable discharge, home loans and medical benefits. Some of the underage service members - a group that included women - were later given bad conduct discharges and dismissed from the service because of their age. Congress has since passed a law that changes their status to honorable.

In "America's Youngest Warriors," one of the few books about minors in the U.S. military, authors Ray and Susan Jackson tell the stories of dozens of young men and women.

Most of the first-person narratives are World War II-era, when many under-age teen-agers signed up for military duty and some slipped through the screening process and into units.

Included in the collection are the stories of local men Melford "Pete" King and Seth T. Wilson Jr., both members of Post 25 and both veterans World War II, Korea and Vietnam.

"I remember getting a letter from the Springville, Utah School Board telling me that I was a truant and that if I didn't get my little hind quarters back to school that I was going to be in trouble," recalled King, 70, a Newport News resident.

"At the time, I was stationed at Tsingtao, China, and had been in the Navy less than a year. Everyone knew how old I was, but no one cared," said King, who joined Navy 10 days after he turned 16.

King, the state commander for VUMS, said he was one of the last U.S. sailors to leave the Chinese port before the Communists took control in 1949.

During the Korean War, King put Marines ashore at Inchon.

Wilson said the motivation for joining the military has changed since he raised his right hand at the age of 16 in 1944 and promised to protect and defend.

"A lot of us joined the military because we were patriotic," said Wilson, who was born in the Panama Canal Zone and joined the Navy at the same age his father joined the Army. "But right now what we have is military welfare. They are coming in because they are being bought," said Wilson, who quit Phoebus High School at 14. He is the Mid-Atlantic Area VUMS commander.

The belief that being a good soldier or sailor overshadowed one's age was mentioned over and over by the men.

"My first sergeant used to say, 'I'm going to check the Bureau of Vital Statistics to find out when you were born.' I think he knew. But if you soldiered and did your job well, they didn't mess with you," said Jim Ferrell, 75, who lives in Tide Mill Farms.

"I don't believe that there was a unit I served with that everyone didn't know my age," said Vic Klemencic, 68, from Denbigh, who joined the Army when he was 15 in 1946 and saw action during the Korean War.

The veterans' stories shed light on their times and their pluck. Many of the veterans came from families that struggled to put food on the table before and after the Great Depression. Male children were expected to make their way in the world at the earliest possible moment.

Then as now, the military was an employer of economic necessity, a crucible of change and an outlet for patriotism.

Ferrell, an orphan who started riding the rails at 12, was sworn into the Army at 15 on Halloween night 1939 by using, he said, forged papers. He was a medic in the South Pacific for 37 months during World War II and saw action in the Philippines and New Guinea.

"Back during these times, the Depression had just ended. The war was big for us. It was three hots (hot meals) and a cot. It was also less inconvenience for the families. They didn't have to feed us," said Ferrell.

"Some people say, 'The Army took your childhood away.' I didn't have much of a childhood anyway," Klemencic said.

Today in the U.S. military, about 7,000 of the 1.5 million active-duty members are under 18. Those age 17 need the written permission of at least one parent to enter the service, and no one younger is legally allowed in.

The Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, based in Geneva, has tried unsuccessfully for years to persuade the U.S. government to stop accepting minors for military service. The organization claims enlisting the young is a form of child abuse.

Don't try telling any of the VUMS about the dark side of child soldiers.

"My mother asked me once if I would have done anything different with my life," said King, who retired from the Navy. "I said that I would do the same damn thing. I don't regret a bit of it. There are a few things I didn't want to see no more. But they only lasted a few seconds or a minute."

Richard William Rogers can be reached at 247-4629 or by e-mail at rrogers@dailypress.com